Ghana has commenced egg exports to Burkina Faso as the government intensifies efforts to address a sustained surplus in domestic poultry production, Minister for Food and Agriculture Eric Opoku has announced.
The exports follow negotiations with Burkinabe authorities after President John Mahama directed the Minister for Food and Agriculture and the Minister for Trade, Agribusiness and Industry, Elizabeth Ofosu-Adjare, to secure access to the neighbouring country’s market. The directive came amid a deepening egg glut that has seen prices plummet and farmers struggle with unsold stock for nearly a year.
According to Mr Opoku, the Ghanaian delegation encountered more than 20 trucks loaded with eggs stranded at the border during the negotiations. Clearance was subsequently granted for all the trucks to enter Burkina Faso.
“Immediately after our negotiations, they allowed all of them to enter; and since then, Ghana has been exporting eggs to Burkina Faso,” Mr Opoku said during an inspection of a poultry, meat and feed processing facility under construction at Bechem in the Ahafo Region.
Background: The Egg Glut and the Burkina Faso Market
The egg surplus has been building since late 2025, when a combination of cheaper feed, increased participation in poultry farming, and the success of the government’s Nkoko Nkitinkiti (Broiler Revitalisation) programme led to a surge in domestic production. Poultry production rose from 4.6 per cent to 22 per cent within the first year of the programme’s implementation, a feat Minister Opoku described as unprecedented in Ghana’s history.
The situation was exacerbated in March 2026 when Burkina Faso imposed restrictions on egg imports from Ghana, particularly those originating from Dormaa in the Bono Region, as a precautionary measure over quality concerns affecting eggs from some exporting countries. The ban, which lasted over two months, led to a sharp oversupply of eggs locally, with farmers, traders and distributors struggling to avoid losses as perishable stock piled up. A crate of eggs sold for between GH¢50 and GH¢55 during this period.
The restrictions were lifted in July 2026 following high-level bilateral talks in Burkina Faso led by Minister Ofosu-Adjare and Minister Opoku. The two countries agreed to establish a Joint Technical Committee to address future trade concerns and committed to pursuing a Bilateral Trade Agreement to strengthen economic cooperation. Ghana’s exports to Burkina Faso had already been growing steadily, increasing from US637 million in 2025, making the Burkina corridor one of the fastest-growing in the sub-region.
The Bechem Processing Facility: A Value-Chain Solution
Speaking at the Bechem inspection, Mr Opoku outlined the government’s broader strategy to address the surplus through value addition. The facility under construction will have two processing lines — one for broilers and another for layers — with a combined capacity of 6,000 birds per hour. It will also include three cold rooms, a feed mill and a hatchery to support production and improve the sustainability of the poultry programme.
To ensure a steady supply of birds, the government plans to establish contractual arrangements with poultry farmers in the Ashanti, Upper East and surrounding regions, under which the factory will purchase and process their output for the market. The hatchery will produce birds for distribution to farmers, who would in turn supply the processing facility. The government is also procuring two trucks to distribute the factory’s packaged and branded products.
President Mahama, who also inspected the facility as part of his two-day Resetting Ghana Tour of the Ahafo Region, said the factory would transform Bechem into Ghana’s poultry capital when operational. He encouraged young people in Bechem and surrounding communities to participate in the programme, noting that they could benefit from poultry farming as well as jobs and business opportunities emerging from the factory.
The consultants and contractor working on the facility indicated that construction was approximately 50 per cent complete, with completion expected by the end of the first quarter of 2027.
School Feeding Programme to Absorb Surplus
The Minister disclosed that exports alone were insufficient to absorb the surplus, prompting the government to consider additional measures to expand the domestic market. His ministry is working with the Minister for Education to implement the President’s directive to include eggs in meals served under the School Feeding Programme.
The National Chairman of the Poultry Farmers Association of Ghana, George Dassah, has advocated for an “egg-a-day” directive under the School Feeding Programme, arguing that the country’s vast student population could easily sustain the poultry industry if local supply is fully integrated into the school feeding agenda. “If that is done, there would be no need to export eggs to Burkina Faso and other neighbouring countries. This will help us expand, create more jobs, and employ more people,” he said.
The government has also explored the possibility of converting excess fresh eggs into powdered products that can be stored longer and distributed more easily than shell eggs, as part of a longer-term strategy to improve value addition within the poultry sector.
Broader Context: A Sector at a Crossroads
Ghana’s poultry sector is at a pivotal moment. Historically, the industry met up to 80 per cent of domestic chicken demand in the 1980s and 1990s, but this figure has since collapsed. According to the US Department of Agriculture, Ghana produced about 60,000 tons of chicken meat in 2023, covering only 18 per cent of total consumption estimated at 330,000 tons. Poultry imports remain between 80 and 95 per cent of total consumption, with the country consuming an estimated 300,000 to 460,000 metric tons annually.
Egg production, however, has fared better, reaching 74,374 metric tons in 2023, a 15 per cent year-on-year increase. The challenge now is not production but market absorption — a challenge the government hopes to address through a combination of export market access, institutional procurement, and value-added processing.
Mr Opoku noted that eggs are now widely sold on streets across the country at two for five cedis, with sellers often adding pepper and onion free of charge — a stark illustration of the market saturation. He also highlighted that the new feed mill would utilize eggshells in feed preparation, creating another use for a by-product that would otherwise go to waste.
The coming months will test whether the combination of cross-border trade, school feeding procurement, and the Bechem processing facility can restore equilibrium to a sector that has become a victim of its own success.
